Saturday, February 24, 2007

Waiting for Godot-Guffman's Parents to Finally Succumb to Cirrhosis of the Closet Drinker's Liver

There is a small part of me that wishes that phone calls with my parents were normal. That is, that there would be a beginning, a middle, and an end that didn't involve one or more of us being drunk, and that there would be meaningful and understandable dialogue. This is never the case.

Here's a bit of what I can remember of a recent phone call with my parents.

The scene is the dining room of Lord Fondleberries lovely seaside home in a north shore subburb of Boston, MA. It is late but not bed time late.

Lord F is fairly well sloshed on cheap, old wine. He's on the phone, long distance, when the call waiting kicks in.

The phone: Annoying digital beep. Fucking annoying digital beep.

Lord F pulls the phone from his ear to look at the caller ID window: The parentals. Shit. Double shit, fuck, shit, and more shit. Fuck.

Uses internal voice Now, I know that Heather wants this call to be from my wonderfully oedipal mother. She wants my mom to say that she's got the perfect color theme-matching dress for the wedding, and that it's not teal, or mauve, or, fuck forbid, white, and that it doesn't have a sweep that would require no fewer than four midgets to carry it down the aisle. This would certainly end Heather's anxiety about my mother making a rediculously dramatic scene. Alas, I just know that this isn't the case, so I ignore the beep.

Lord F finishes the current conversation and hangs up the phone. Minutes later . . .

Lord F thinking he's using his internal voice, but speaking aloud: Awwww fuck. Why is it him? It can't be. He only calls when my ass needs to be on the line (read: beaten) for some pro-fill-in-the-anti-Republicunt-blank-here-shit, and he needs to tell me so. And I haven't marched for any Liberal causes lately, well, I am voting for Hillary and/or Obama in 2008, but he can't know that. It fucking can't be him. Suddenly realizing he's talking out loud. Oh, shit.

Lord F uses internal voice: Our credit card's been robbed? We have a credit card together? And it's been broken into? Wait, he must think he's talking to my brother. They did give my 28 year-old brother a credit card for Christmas last year. It must be that.

Dad slurring: Son? You there? You hear what I say? It's been robbed into. On the internet. In London. Hello?